Preventing the consequences of the global financial crisis from being resolved in the EU, Spanish public debt has passed a record €1 trillion. According to the Bank of Spain, the country’s public debt topped one trillion euros for the first time in June, thus representing 98.4% of last year’s GDP. Thus, over the past six years, Spain’s public debt has doubled. According to Spain's Economy Minister Luis de Guindos, extra funds allocated to autonomous regions to repay their debts to service providers as well as the implementation of the program of financial stabilization of Spanish banks are said to be the reasons of growing public debt.
Spain’s debt load is estimated at 300 percent of gross domestic product, experts at Hong Kong-based Standard Chartered say. Based on previous year’s forecasts, the Spanish debt was to constitute 99.8 percent of GDP. In 2013, it was €961 billion or 93.9 percent of GDP. For comparison’s sake, back in 2011 the country’s debt constituted 68.5 percent of GDP.
The Spanish government outlook suggests Span’s economy would grow about 0.7 percent in 2014 and unemployment would be below the level of 26 percent. For context, the economy of Spain had been hit hard during the financial crisis of 2008, and then during the European debt crisis. The rate of unemployment in Spain hovers around 25 percent. In 2012, Madrid sought €42 billion in European funds to recapitalize its banking sector.
